Signing In

By Richard Risemberg|April 17, 2013

It’s been years since I began suggesting to (ie, nagging) the LADOT for simple street signs along the Los Angeles River bike path from Griffith Park to Elysian Park. While on weekends the park-to-park stretch is a roadie’s paradise, the route seed a great deal of transportational cycling traffic as well, not to mention neighborhood folks out of a pleasant cruise or stroll.

The southern end serves several large residential neighborhoods and a wide variety of employment centers, form light industrial to local retail and a couple of bigboxes such as the Home Depot on Figueroa.

It also has entrances (and exits, of course) at over a dozen local streets.

…Not a single one of which is signed. That’s right, unless you are intimately familiar with the back yard of the last house on the road, you won’t know where the heck you are along the bike path. Trying to find a particular address? Give it up, buddy!

Two and a half years ago, LADOT sent a nice fellow out to do a ride-along with me, plotting where simple street signs should go (as well as some wayfinding signs, indicating what lay how far in what direction). He took extensive notes and pedaled them back to HQ.

When I checked on progress a few weeks later, I was told that the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority would be taking care of it instead of LADOT.

Fast forward to the present: I rode the path about two weeks ago, and…no signs.

Cross town to Culver City, which hosts a beautiful mile or two of separated bikeway alongside Metro’s Expo Line. This path was built a few years after the LA River path Elysian Valley segment. And when I rode on it a few days ago, what did I see?

This:

It may be Metro’s path, but those are Culver City’s signs.

Making the way easy for people coming home, visiting a friend, looking for a restaurant on a particular street…in other words, actually using the path to get somewhere.

Likewise, the LA River path might not technically be LA’s property (the river’s jurisdictional complications are elaborate, involving among others the Army Corps of Engineers), but the benefit of well-signed path would fall to Los Angeles neighborhoods such as Atwater, Echo Park, Cypress Park, Elysian Vally, and more.

So…why palm the signage off on MRCA, who hasn’t done anything with it anyway? This path is a transportation corridor serving the city of Los Angeles. It should have the same standard street signs as any other similar facility.

If little Culver City can do it, I am sure Los Angeles can manage it. Somehow.

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